


3C

by mneiai



Category: DC Cinematic Universe, DCU
Genre: Batman vs Superman spoilers, M/M, Manipulation, Mildly Dubious Consent, Morally Ambiguous Character, a weird ship I can't let go of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-03
Updated: 2016-04-03
Packaged: 2018-05-30 21:14:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6441025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mneiai/pseuds/mneiai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was always walking a fine line between his identities--he was Green Lantern, he was Pol Manning, he was not Hal Jordan. Hal Jordan was dead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a really weird idea I randomly had earlier today. I may expand on or add to this, I'm undecided at this point.
> 
> There are some references to my headcanon for Hal in the DCEU, mainly that he was taken from Earth immediately upon receiving his ring and was not allowed to return, thus why there weren't sightings of him.
> 
> Unbeta'd. Originally posted on tumblr at mostdangerouslantern.

"Where did you get this data?"

Superman turned back to the League, observing them as a group. "It came from...Lex Luthor," he finally admitted, as Batman gritted his teeth and nodded confirmation.

"What?!" Hal had already been floating on the side of the table, never bothering to sit down at it, else he would have stood to emphasize his point. "You can't trust him, he's a sociopath!"

Everyone else took the outburst at face value as they weighed the benefits against the risks, but Hal could feel Batman's eyes lingering on him and knew he'd said too much. He was always walking a fine line between his identities--he was Green Lantern, he was Pol Manning, he was not Hal Jordan. Hal Jordan was dead.

~~~

"He looked for you, you know."

"What?" Taken aback by the sudden appearance of the Bat, and the topic that had nothing to do with his current patrol, Hal landed on the roof next to him, waiting for an explanation.

"Luthor." Hal thought his heart might be pounding hard enough to push its way through his chest. Surely even someone with human senses could tell. "After your plane was reported as destroyed and you dead, he had the crash site examined. There weren't any human remains."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Hal Jordan. I looked him up, he's the only pilot Luthor's ever had any sort of interest in besides business. He was a major funder for Ferris Air about a decade ago, threw all sorts of money around to get his military prototypes tested there." Batman cocked his head to the side, face expressionless, but Hal could sense the smugness in his tone. "Some hotshot pilot worked out of there, on loan from the Air Force. Harold Jordan, the most stereotypical flyboy you could imagine...except he didn't really have any _preferences_ when it came to who he slept with."

The ring was good for lots of things, regulating bodily responses was one of them. His nostrils flared, his eyes widened, but the other signs of his surprise he kept under control. "So? It seems like Luthor's known for his...pet projects."

"Except when those projects suddenly fail in an unexplainable crash, he'll let others handle the cleanup. He took an interest in this one. He took an interest in _you_."

There'd been too many hints over the last year, too many little details he'd handed over to Batman without thinking. Having lived in California, having been a pilot, his love for dangerous, fast tech. Of course someone like him would eventually have enough of the puzzle to guess what the picture was.

"So what do you want? A prize? Luthor and I fucked a lifetime ago. Now he's locked up and I'm not even supposed to be on this planet."

There was something softer in Bruce's eyes, something that made Hal feel just about as pathetic as he ever had. "I don't care who you are, or who you pretend to be, as long as it doesn't make trouble for the League."

"It won't. It couldn't."

~~~

Lex escaped, eventually. He didn't sneak out in the night, he didn't blow up his cell or fake his death. He convinced the world he was falsely imprisoned, and then he seemed to save it when the League couldn't. For a few weeks, he had higher approval ratings than Superman.

Batman's paranoia proved helpful for Hal, letting him avoid most of the fights where he might encounter Lex. Eventually, though, his luck ran out.

~~~

He remembered their first time: a fancy hotel that Lex had wined and dined Hal and Carol at, an invitation to come up to his room and discuss a few details after Carol had headed home for the night. Clever hands mapping his body, as if they could discover all his secrets if they just touched enough.

He'd jokingly called Lex 'sir', then kept doing it after the reaction it got. A silk tie more expensive than his entire wardrobe around his wrists, teeth marks along his collarbone that took a whole week to fade. If they hadn't just sold their souls to Lex Corp for the contract, Hal would have still felt owned after that night. 

And then it just...kept happening. Hal was a pilot, his preferred planes were the sort of dangerous that scared most people, he could handle Lex's moods, Lex's scurrying thoughts. He even liked it, the way he liked everything that could get him killed.

Two weeks before his recruitment, he'd brought up moving to Metropolis. Three days before, Lex had wiped all the apartment hunt details off his computer and gave him a pass to his penthouse.

After the ring landed on his finger and the world exploded into green light and shrapnel, Hal had been too distracted to process what he'd been forced to leave behind.

~~~

"Clever trick, can you impersonate anyone?" 

Lex's eyes tracked every movement Hal made, his finger never straying from the button that would bring the whole building down around them and the thousand so workers inside. 

"No, I've never been good at those sorts of games, Lex."

He flinched. Hal tensed. Technically, he had enough power left in his ring to contain the blast--as long as he wasn't trying to protect himself from it.

"Is it a trick of perception, then? Our eyes reflecting back whoever we'd want to see?"

Hal wished he could look away from Lex's hand, study his face, try to figure out what the hell he was thinking (he used to be so good at that, surely that wasn't a skill he could lose?). "Why would you want to see me? You don't normally dwell on the dead." He'd killed Mercy, Superman had told him that, and if Lex was willing to sacrifice her he'd take out anyone. 

"We never found a body. There was no trace of human remains at the crash site." Lex had grown used to impossible things, it seemed. 

His hand shook, inched away from the button. Hal didn't let himself relax. He looked up at Lex's face, catching his eyes before they lowered to Hal's hand, to his ring.

"It found me during that test flight. It...enlisted me."

"And you're not entirely you anymore, are you?"

"It's a neurological interface." Lex took a sharp breath.

Hal took a step closer, staying on the ground to make himself seem more normal. It was so odd, seeing a familiar face from his past, after he'd tried so hard to avoid everyone. 

"I knew you weren't dead. I _knew_ it." 

He reached out and touched the barrier over Hal's cheek. After a moment, Hal let it drop, his shielding fading until it was just his uniform, his real eyes looking out from his mask.

"I know. I heard you looked for me."

Lex gave a beatific smile, eyes beginning to twinkle with amusement, madness, Hal wasn't quite sure. "And now...I've found you."

If it was anyone else, in any other situation, Hal thought he would have been ready for it. But this was Lex, his first meeting with him after so long, and of course he looked shifty, he _always_ did.

Still, he'd curse himself when he woke up for ever letting him get that close.


	2. Chapter 2

Hal woke up in stages. Reaching out, he encountered the faint buzz that signaled his ring was still on his finger and then allowed himself to focus on his surroundings. What he heard, what he felt.

It was a comfortable bed, a quiet room, the steady sound of a single person's footfalls the only noticeable noise. He opened his eyes a sliver, watching Lex pace, studying and cataloging him the way he would any enemy. When it didn't seem like he was going to be allowed a moment alone any time soon, he opened his eyes completely, shifting on the bed as though he was just waking.

"You couldn't get it off." Hal's voice was bland as he sat up, noticing his uniform still firmly in place.

Lex turned to face him, giving a startled expression Hal immediately decided was fake. "No. It wouldn't even let me take off the finger."

Hal grimaced, glad Lex didn't try for the whole arm. He had seen that succeed with other Lanterns. 

"Satisfied now? Can I go?"

"Go? Go where? Back to your petty little heroing with your new friends? Back to the pathetic little life you gave yourself so you could pretend to still be one of us?"

"I _am_ still human, Lex. I bet your tests showed you that."

"Hmm, yes, still within the realm of possibilities for a human, but not a very natural one." Lex moved suddenly, crawling onto the bed. "Have they found a universal form of conditioning?"

If Lex didn't want to let him out, Hal was going to have to fight to escape. And he didn't feel like fighting, yet, not against whatever Lex Luthor had up his sleeves. Instead he fell back to the bed, the back of his head hitting the pillow with a soft sound.

"It's not all that different from what we do to our own military personnel." 

Lex nodded at that, taking a cellphone out that Hal hadn't noticed before and typing something. "Then human methods for _breaking_ it may work as well."

"What? Whoa, Lex--"

"We already have one alien flying above us, manipulating us into a false sense of security. I refuse to allow _you_ to be the other one."

"Because we used to fuck sometimes? Lex, this is ridiculous."

Something slid across Lex's face, cold and dark, _dangerous_. Hal realized he was suddenly seeing what Clark spoke of, when he told his tales of fighting Lex. Then, just like that, it was gone. "Ah, lessening your attachments to your homeworld, very sly of them."

"Lex--"

"Not to worry, we'll find a way to fix that, too." His hands planted on Hal's cheeks, he loomed over him, smirking. "You'll be the old Hal soon enough, good as new."

Hal wondered if Clark would hear it if he screamed.

~~~

When Hal had realized he was seeing Lex too often not to call it a relationship, he'd gone on a bender. Tom had to drag him out of the last bar, where he'd gotten into a fight with five marines after seeing one grope a waitress. He'd, of course, been losing horribly, but was too drunk to notice.

In the morning, patched up by Tom's expert hand's and Carol's favorite hangover remedy, he'd left Lex a voicemail. If they'd actually been dating, he'd have felt bad.

Lex showed up by the end of the day, leaning against Hal's beat up car at the edge of the parking lot, looking for all the world like someone's annoying kid brother.

"Didn't you get my message?"

Hal wasn't so cowardly as to hastily reach over and lock the door to keep Lex out, so he ended up driving towards his favorite diner with Lex Luthor in his passenger seat.

"What is it, exactly, that isn't working out for you?" The tone was nothing but intellectual curiosity, as if Lex had no personal stake in what was happening.

Eyes fixed to the road, Hal had answered, stiltedly, "You realize I'm still in the Air Force, right? I'm on loan to Ferris as part of their contract."

"Yes, and...?"

"DADT?"

"Ah. Of course. It's not the sex that's suddenly become unpalatable, it's your sense of commitment to the prejudices of your masters." Hal's hands tightened on the steering wheel. "But that could have been a concern weeks, nay months ago. Why now?" Lex lazily rolled down his window, leaning his head partway out, his hair flitting wildly in the wind. "Commitment. You couldn't handle it with dear Ms. Ferris, not after what marriage and promises had done to your mother."

"Shut the fuck up, Lex." He hadn't told Lex about any of that, assumed it was in his file somewhere, or maybe Lex had hired someone to dig it up. Privacy didn't exist around Lex Luthor.

"Do calm down, Harold. I'm not looking for wedding bells and picket fences." 

A hand settled heavily on Hal's thigh, and worry and intrigue unseated his anger. "It doesn't matter, if word about this gets out to the wrong people, I'm done. My career is over."

Lex snorted. "You'd get discharged and I'd have you flying the exact same planes for me the next day."

"Until this whatever-it-is between us starts to bore you."

"Hm, point." The fingers slid up, caressing Hal's inner thigh as Lex paused. "Then, consider this: I recently inherited the entire family fortune from dear old dead dad. I am rich, and powerful, and know where a very many skeletons are hidden. And to cross you over _us_ would be to cross _me_."

Hal had other reasons why they needed to break up, but as Lex rambled on with unceasing logic about why they could keep it up, he'd known there would be equally good counters for anything else. He'd taken Lex back to his place, instead of the diner, and they'd had sex in Hal's bed for the first time. There was something hollow about it, that settled in the pit of Hal's chest, but over time that became easy enough to ignore.

~~~

Hal hadn't left Lex's home in six days.

There were no emergencies, Lex was fond of telling him, and no reason for Green Lantern. And without Green Lantern, who was he? Lex had picked apart his newly formed civilian identity, mocking the hasty background Hal had created, and burning with humiliation Hal had agreed it was largely useless. He barely even lived that life.

He kept his shields up constantly now. He thought that was what Lex wanted--it was a slow drain on his power, not the same as a fight might be, but without his battery eventually Hal's ring would be too weak to keep its grip on him. At least, that's what Hal thought Lex believed. 

Hal spent most of those days lounging in the bed. Lex's bed. The bed they shared. A house with dozens of rooms, with beds and couches and even very comfortable chairs, but Lex has settled Hal into his bedroom and Hal had found no good way to deny him. It had been almost a decade since he'd known another human's touch and Lex remembered every spot that made Hal's body sing for him.

A part of Hal wondered if Lex was trying to break him. Another part acknowledged that with enough time, he'd succeed.


End file.
